nez

It is a reality that not everyone lives through a relapse and gets the chance to get back in the boat. Sometimes the result of suicide, sometimes a traffic accident and even worse is that sometimes they take totally innocent bystanders with them. Sometimes due to their bodies giving out due to prolonged abuse. There are a myriad of possibilities of needless tragedy ending in death when alcohol is involved. And what about the family of the relapser that are left behind to deal with the grief and wind up tearing themselves apart wondering were they went wrong and what they could have done differently. All of this is a reality that I have seen happen this more times than I care to.

Mizz

Ive relapsed multiple times over the last decade.

My relapses did start out with small amounts of alcohol. A few weeks into the relapse and I would be back to one bottle of wine. This past year the amount increased from one bottle to a bottle and half. Two bottles.

The anxiety increased. The hangovers were worse. I was then stuck in a place of knowing I had to quit and unable to get myself to stop. Week after week. I just could not quit. It was torture like I had never truly understood until I couldnt get off the drunk wagon. I was desperate.

So, it is true that alcoholism gets worse with time. It can take us to places we never thought we would see.

Wastinglife

During my worst drinking period, I drank a fifth of vodka minimum everyday for 2 years. On a Saturday I would often drink a handle to myself.

I had to stop the hard liquor after I ended up in the ER with alcohol-induced Hepatitis, or swollen liver. I switched to beer. I drank the beer alcoholically too but it's not quite as damaging to one's health as spirits can be.

Also, I am much less likely to 'blackout' with beer as I often did with vodka. Either way, I can't drink anything responsibly anymore...

Zencat

I think I understand what you are conveying Rody and your in the right place to find ways to quit drinking.

At my worst I would drink 1.75L of cheep vodka in 24 hours while high on amphetamines. That's self-destruction and it hurt me in a very bad way.

Recovery has not come easy for me. Yet I remain steadfast with my daily wellness action plan. Its been said here on SR thousands of times: if hard case like me can get sober, so can you.

fini

rodyda, a belated welcome.
i haven’t relapsed in a long time, and rarely drank spirits(what a word!!).
just wanted to let you know that it does not need to be an everyday struggle and yearslong battle.
look around here, read lots, see what folks are doing, how they are doing it, and you will find there are quite a few who have found ways of satisfaction and, yes, joy in sober living.
glad you’re here.

Surrendered19

There might be something very wrong with relapsing rodyda. What if you cannot stop again and are unable to get back into the boat? You could die my friend. You chose to stop this time but there is a time if you keep picking up that you will lose that power. It is a certainty.

rodyda

I found a lot of this very helpful. I feel like in failing before I was simply avoiding alcohol, I hadn’t made a conscious decision to live as someone who doesn’t drink it and chooses to sobriety. I was kinda mapping out how I want the next few years to go and I found myself thinking that since my teens I can’t find many social situations where alcohol wasn’t present in some capacity, and I intend to navigate around those influences to keep my sobriety from here on out. But I am, like everyone, imperfect so I can make mistakes, I was just curious how others handled those situations. I thank you all so much.

Surrendered19

I do not want to pester you rodyda, but the point is that you and me and our community of recovering addicts are indeed imperfect, but we have given up the luxury of making "mistakes" as those chances run out, and countless others could no longer "handle those situations." Our collective memories her on SR are littered with corpses and shattered lives from folks who took one too many drinks.

OK. The last I'll say is that I am SO glad you are here on SR. This is a great community and you are already a great part of it.

biminiblue

That's absolutely it, rodyda.

Quit and then every decision and action going forward is made with the Intention to Never Drink Again.

The peer pressure? If people pressure you (which they won't if you choose your companions thoughtfully) just laugh and have an answer ready. Honestly, it doesn't really happen in polite company.

People who would pressure you have their own poorly defended boundaries, their own drinking problems or their own control issues.

owen90

All I drank was hard spirits. Was getting through about a 750 ml (a fifth I think it is in the US) bottle per night/every couple of nights at my worst as well as going out drinking on top of that. My tolerance for dark rum became insane. I took it to work mixed with my pepsi to get me through the shift because of the post-drinking come-down anxiety I kept getting.

Beer and wine just didnt get me to place where I thought I needed to get to. This was for at least 8 years. My resulting damage are residual cognition issues with my memory and I fumble my speech a lot, IE tripping over my words. I also have a damaged esophagus and bad acid reflux as a result of that which makes my voice crack all the time. Other than those things I am lucky to not have life threatening issues. Although i'm sure my esophagus will come back to haunt me one day down the road.

rodyda

Yeah, I have a friend who’s brother is like my stepdad and is already battling cirrhosis and severe health issues and he never made it to 30, so it’s a real eye opener. I am truly glad to have found this place, i feel like I’ve found a group who gets it. I prob misworded myself a bit previously, and I apologize. I’ve lived at home with my parents since I had a back surgery and left uni. So once I slipped into a bad way, I sought family for help and it got me no where and I was met with a lot of resistance by them to going to rehab, but honestly wish I woulda done that originally. They don’t get it. But they were also content to sit by and watch me drink myself to death, which is heartbreaking. I hope the support and strength I find here carries through the hard times ahead in recovery. I, and everyone else here, can do this.

PeacefulWater12

I used switching about between beer and spirits as part of my mind games to make it ok to myself to keep drinking.

Personally I think alcohol is alcohol. Doesn't matter what the flavour or colour or strength is.

I think I used to drink the same alcohol level, it was far harder work to reach that level in beers! Less fluid intake needed to reach that level if it was spirit.

MissPerfumado

Hi rodyda, thank you for sharing a bit more of your concerns.

Two things stand out for me about your situation.

First, you are relatively young compared to some of us here who only 'got it' in our 40s and 50s. This is a huge advantage on your part. However, I do get that the peer pressure aspect may be different for you.

Second thing is, your family's attitude towards drinking. You sound like you're in a culture where drinking hard is accepted and almost encouraged, not as a work or social culture but as a family and home dynamic.

I was surprised when I got sober to find out how many young celebrities had quit drinking, like Daniel Radcliffe, James Franco and Natalie Portman. I think they did it because they were exposed to a hard-drinking culture young and they got the heck out of it as it was destroying them before they had even hit the primes of their lives. So there are people who have done it out there.

I think you'll find that you will eventually construct a whole new life for yourself, one that is quite distant from your family environment. As you get stronger in sobriety, their ways will have so little in common with yours that you will grow apart. While you live with them though, you will need to be very vigilant.

Finally, I do agree with a few others that you should not view relapse as something that will inevitably happen. If it happens, of course we must get back onto the wagon pronto, that is the best approach. Apart from knowing you'll get back into sobriety asap, relapse is not part of a good recovery plan.

rodyda

I don’t view relapse as an inevitability, but as something more like an obstacle you try to avoid! But my main curiosity was that as I’ve struggled with it for the last year, I always found myself in the same pattern, and I was curious if others found themselves in that situation. And arguably at times I was worse than before. But I got my answer and I’m satisfied with it, I know lots of people have far more experience in the road to recovery than I so I’m willing to ask my questions whatever they may be so maybe I can sponge some of that insight. Thanks